


Educational Purposes

by JazzRaft



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Humor, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-29 21:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16752151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JazzRaft/pseuds/JazzRaft
Summary: Crowe has been helping the Crown Prince hone his magical prowess. She has some very unconventional means - "practical application" she says - of teaching him how.





	Educational Purposes

**Author's Note:**

> Originally filled for a prompt [here!](http://jazzraft.tumblr.com/post/180488538807/noct-crowe-bonding-magic-training)

“Just trust me.”

“I don’t think that…”

“ _Trust_. _Me._ ”

“I can count on two hands how many people have advised me against that.”

Crowe should probably find it in herself to be offended, but the idea of having a cautionary reputation just made her grin. Good! Keep ‘em on their toes. Give the King’s enemies – even the King’s friends – some rumors and reasons to fear the Kingsglaive. She could count herself proud to be considered one of those rumors and/or reasons.

Nevertheless, if this was going to work, she needed the Prince’s cooperation.

“C’mon, Junior! Have I steered you wrong yet?” She didn’t give him a chance to point out the prophetic implications of the word “ _yet._ ” “The best way to learn is by example.”

“This seems like a pretty extreme example.”

Crowe dismissed his concerns with a wave and a snort. Oh, this sweet, naïve, little boy. If he thought this was extreme, it was a damn good thing he had a ways to go before he was in charge of the Kingsglaive – and thereby privy to Commander Drautos’s “accident” reports. And those weren’t even _half_ of what they got up to without the Commander ever knowing enough to file them away in the Incidents Cabinet.

“Junior…”

“It’s Noct…”

“Junior. The whole basis of these lessons is to teach you how to use your magic to totally obliterate your enemies.”

“Nyx isn’t the enemy…”

“He is today!”

If not for educational purposes, then at least for the pleasure of her own vindication. This would serve Nyx right for stealing her bike in the dead of night for a booty call. While she was teaching Noctis how to be a human spark plug, she could teach Nyx, at the same time, that there were _literally_ royal consequences for abusing his borrowing privileges. She was just multi-tasking, nothing extreme about that. She was just using the royal battery pack of untapped potential for her own nefarious ends, nothing morally gray to accuse her of there.

Besides, she knew a kindred spirit in mischievousness when she saw one. Noctis was a little firecracker just waiting for someone to come by with a box of matches to set him off. And Crowe was just the pyromaniac-in-the-making to do it.

Noctis gnawed on his lower lip, peering out from their hiding place in the corridor at the target of Crowe’s vengeance. Nyx was training alone down in the dusty bowl the Kingsglaive was delegated to for warp practice. He was whistling to himself as he went through the rhythm of controlled warp-bursts, twirling his kukris over his knuckles as he landed out of each one. He was entirely too pleased with himself for Crowe’s liking, the most blatant display of “I got laid” she’d ever seen.

He needed a lesson in humility. Noctis needed a lesson in magical electricity.

“Fine,” the Prince finally conceded, with a nervous, rickety sigh. “But we’re not going to, like, hurt the guy, right?”

This was why Crowe was so fond of the kid. The little punk was so selflessly kind, only prepared to use his powers to be helpful, harmless, and never lethal unless he absolutely needed to defend himself or his friends. She didn’t teach him that, he came to her pre-programmed with a good heart. The first month of tutoring him in elemental magic had her going home to a good, hard look in the mirror to criticize her own corruptive influence on the kid – and his corruption of genuine goodness on her.

Crowe gripped him by the shoulder and smiled. “’Course not. I’ve lead you down a couple dark paths, kiddo. But never _that_ dark.”

Noctis smiled back, a little glint of impish delight over the permission to pull a prank warming Crowe’s sinful scrap of a heart. This would be quick, and painless, and, most importantly, leave a lasting, mental reminder of the sheer magnitude of her displeasure on Nyx.

“Alright,” she coached, bracing one arm on the wall as she analyzed Nyx’s oblivious antics down below. “Here’s how this is gonna go, kiddo.”

She’d choreographed her grand vision of revenge with him on the way there already, but now that he had truly consented to executing it, she needed to double-check he was clear on what to do, for all their safeties and peace of mind. She didn’t want to get Nyx injured and have that guilt burden her lovable charge’s shoulders for the rest of his life. She just wanted her old friend to feel her wrath – and maybe provide Noctis the small thrill of a little trouble-making in the process.

Noctis watched Nyx’s pattern across the dust bowl, pacing himself with a tap of his finger against his thigh to keep himself in time with the movements. He counted, he telegraphed, and when Nyx vanished into the next warp, he timed the toss of his little lightning-bolts to meet his boots when he stepped out again.

It was less of a shocking spell, more of a stunning spell. As stunned as Crowe felt when she walked into the parking garage to find her only means of transportation to work missing and an “IOU” text waiting on her phone in the morning. It didn’t hurt – she’d been on the receiving end of this kind of fuzzy, discomforting, locked-joint kind of spell before – but it bolted through Nyx like a frog in ice water, striking up his hair in a static-electric charge and sending him down into a comically boneless pile.

“Ha!” Crowe jeered, warping down to Nyx’s prone side, staring wide-eyed and slightly smoking up at the sky and her vengeful face obscuring the sun. “Try stealing my bike again and I’ll have it cursed just like this, buddy. Remember the spell!”

Nyx wheezed an approximation of the words “you” and “suck” and that was a good enough compliment for Crowe. She knelt down, patted his cheek, promised him he’d live – but not if he ever pulled a stunt like that again – then called Noctis down to slap him with a high-five.

Later, when Nyx had recovered enough to achieve basic language functions, and Noctis secretly offered to buy him a drink in recompense – Crowe wouldn’t have approved; that was just rewarding bad behavior, if you asked her – Nyx grunted,

“This is how evil dictators are made, you know.”

“This is how I learn about law enforcement,” Noctis teased. “Grand theft auto is a very serious offense, you know.”

Nyx had to reiterate, with the everlasting image of Crowe’s dark grin silhouetted against a pitiless sun, “You both suck.”


End file.
